Psycho-Halakhah

Psycho-Halakhah

Post-Holocaust American Judaism Collections at the University of Colorado Boulder

2013

Stephanie Yuhas, Netanel Miles-Yepez, Deborah Fink, Sue Salinger, David Shneer, Andrew Violet, and Jacob Flaws.

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English

Psycho-Halakhah, is a term coined by Zalman Schachter-Shalomi for use in Jewish Renewal. Halakhah is the Hebrew word for Jewish law. The Integral or Psycho-Halakhic process refers to a way of approaching legal decisions within Judaism that is more holistic, taking the needs of the time, the place, and the people into consideration. Looking at the original function of the law or commandment, and the original context, one tries to see how it would best apply today, to achieve similar ends.

Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi blowing the shofar in front of the Capital Building in Washington D.C., just prior to the first Iraq War, ca. 1990.